


Historical Reintegration

by tritonvert



Series: Necromancy Enforcement Agency [1]
Category: French Revolution RPF
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-25
Updated: 2013-04-07
Packaged: 2017-12-03 14:31:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 12,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/699279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tritonvert/pseuds/tritonvert
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Life is hard for a case-worker in the Necromancy Enforcement Agency.  Research seriously, write ridiculously.  I guess there are language warnings and Hitler gets mentioned in the first paragraph.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Petty, and yet whimsically fantastical

When I tell people I work with the Necromancy Enforcement Agency I generally get one of two reactions, both tiresome to deal with. First: “You’re the guys that are using our tax dollars to feed fifty Hitlers, right?” Second: “I know why there’s laws about this but I still can’t believe in sending someone to prison for trying to get his dead child back.” On the second count, I agree with you; fortunately there are far fewer cases than you’d expect of people trying to resurrect loved ones. The process of necromancy is…inherently disrespectful and intrusive. On the first count, there have only been eighteen known cases of Hitler resurrection in the US and we have a standing agreement with Germany for extradition. They deal with the Hitlers, we lock up the neo-nazi shit-heads. I don’t even know why “feed fifty Hitlers” is a thing, aside from the alliteration. And that’s as much as I’m going to say about Hitler, so if you were thinking you’d stop reading because you don’t feel like dealing with that stuff, you can come back now.

Nah. I deal with Historical Reintegration. Historical being anything that predates the Magical Revolution, which conveniently also means historical as in “at least eighty-plus years old.” Yes, it’s the “using your tax money to feed”…crap, I wasn’t going to go there again. But yeah, it’s _that_ department, only mostly we have Founding Fathers and some Confederacy types, one or two old movie stars, a few Ancient Egyptians waiting to go home (no, I haven’t met Cleopatra), some very unhappy Sioux…and the French Revolution. Why do we have the French Revolution, you ask me? Why do we have the French Revolution, I ask myself? Why does France not have the French Revolution? It is, after all, one of their founding historical events. The short answer, of course, is that they do; I don’t know how many Robespierres they have, and Napoleons, and Desmoulinseses and Saint-Justs and Dantons, but they have them. And yet here in the US we’ve had these people too for weeks now with no sign of them going home any time soon.

I’m not privy to all the politics but I suspect the hang-up is much the same as we get whenever someone has the idea of bringing back Washington or Jefferson. You get a few obsessive nut-cases who want the Word of God (In the Form of Their Historical Idol) to come and proclaim itself on the modern world, and then it gets turned into pop news sounds, and some political party gets hold of the poor soul—and that’s the best-case scenario. Worst-case is the assassinations—remember the Malcolm X tragedy a few years back? the one that drastically changed the way we handle these cases?—or the mental breakdowns. For every one Ada Lovelace who becomes joint CEO of a multinational company there are five (literally) Marie Antoinettes who can’t cope with their shared space in the new world. So, yes, France has its own crop of historical resurrections to cope with and they’re in no rush to take ours. I have the feeling they're going to pull one of those dodges where they decide these aren't the _real_ Danton, Robespierre, etc. and stick us with them permanently.

Which leaves me managing a group home with these folks, trying to get them up to speed on washing machines and grocery shopping, trying to get them to a point where they can take a job somewhere and get off the vaunted taxpayer’s dollar. Only with these guys there isn’t even a plan like that. We’re just killing time, trying to keep them sane until someone works out with France what to do. And me with my high school French, I’m the one sweeping up the mess.

Case in point: Yesterday, someone broke into the liquor cabinet. Why "broke in?" Why are there restrictions against grown men and women consuming perfectly legal substances? I don’t know, but them’s the rules, I don’t make ‘em. (Actually, I do know, it's because the rate of substance-abuse issues in historical cases is ridiculous.) This morning I had to clean up the empty bottles and a puke-filled waste-basket (thank you Desmoulins), dispense aspirins, and search Danton’s room for the vodka bottle. Now I’m on his shit-list and I have to hear them bitch about it forever. Does this sound petty? Petty, and yet whimsically fantastical? Oh, I know it does. Such is my life. Whimsically fucking fantastical. Later today we take a field trip to Whole Foods and I pray to God they can wrap their silly heads around the presence of people of color. The first field trip went poorly.

The first field trip always goes poorly.


	2. End-of-term prank

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How did we get to this point in life?

So the French Revolution came into my life the day after Christmas. Thank you, Santa! It’s what I’ve always wanted. And by “the day after Christmas” I mean “four in the morning on the 26th.” I was taking the shitty Christmas night shift because…oh, well, Life Decisions. My job is not conducive to healthy long-term relationships, and my family are Jewish anyway, so why not let the folks with kiddies have the holiday off? 

Anyway, it was one of the classic situations: a State Trooper had pulled over to investigate a couple of men in tee-shirts and sweatpants huddled on the side of Rt. 2 a shade after midnight. It being Christmas, he’d been thinking in terms of rounding up drunks, but it turned out they were absolutely petrified of the highway—having never seen a car. One of them spoke little-to-no English, the other spoke it “funny, like not just an accent but funny” but was able to get across that they’d come through the woods from a house where more of their friends were imprisoned. High drama, isn’t it? Like one of those made-for-TV movies about some poor kid that gets kidnapped and hidden away for five years in some sicko’s basement and we’re all so curious to hear every detail? Well—necromancy isn’t so different from a kidnapping, in its way. 

It took a few hours for the cops to find the guys, get them out of there, figure out that they needed the NEA, all that. So we get the call at four in the morning and my boss asks the two of us that are there with her, “does anyone know any French?” I say something about AP classes in high school, et voilà. (Or viola, like I see a lot.)

The investigative branch is still working on the case, but it’s ugly. Bright Harvard students having an end-of-term prank, only instead of painting some classroom pink or whatever, they dropped several thousand dollars on getting together the wherewithal to bring back some of the high-profile revolutionaries. Rich kids. I’ve heard some rumors on and off that it was some one of those Secret Rich Kid Club initiation rites, not just a prank, but I don’t know if I buy that. They’d kept them locked up in the basement of this big old house in Lincoln—not exactly near Walden Pond, like some of the news reports said, but one of the other ponds in that general area. I probably shouldn’t be getting too specific, anyway. It hasn’t gone to trial yet and those kids have lawyers that will jump on any irregularity like an NEA employee blathering on about the case online

yeah, so this isn’t ever getting posted anywhere  
but i can tell myself some day i’ll sell the screenplay or whatever, right?

Moving along: Over the course of two weeks they had resurrected first Robespierre, then Marat, then Desmoulins, then Saint-Just, and last Danton. It took them a little while to get hold of enough of Danton’s handwriting. And then they left them locked up over Christmas break. One of the Boston kids—the one whose granddaddy’s house it was—was looking after them but he took Christmas off to open prezzies and drink eggnog and what-not. It was Marat and Saint-Just who worked a basement window loose (note to self: when imprisoning victims don’t use a basement with a window, what the hell) and got through to seek help. Fairly heroic. Kind of makes me wish I liked them better, you know?

I do, actually. I do. But each and every one of those guys is a huge pain in my ass.


	3. Robespierre is my breakfast buddy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> NEA babysitting. The best part of waking up is Camille Desmoulins crying in his cup.

Group home living. It’s not as bad as it sounds. I mean, I’m sure it is if we’re talking about how the state takes care of vulnerable children in unstable situations, but the Necromancy Enforcement Agency homes are frankly some of the nicest places I’ve lived. The Revolution and I are in a well-enough maintained formerly-multi-family house in one of the nicer ‘burbs. The NEA looks for locations that are busy enough for passive neighborhood exposure to the modern world but not so busy as to overwhelm. Walking distance to some challenging-but-not-too-challenging destinations like a corner store, a barbershop, a library. Walking distance to public transportation. And of course a fenced yard so the residents don’t run off and get hit by a car.

The goal for the Historical Reintegration program is, of course, self-sufficiency. But no one expects that overnight. We’ve found that when we push historical cases too fast the breakdown rate soars. They’ll keep it together for a few months and then suddenly there they are in the middle of a grocery store curled up in a ball and crying. So for the first several months I expect to be up and in the kitchen by seven, on hand to get breakfast ready. That’s seven to nine-thirty. If someone gets up earlier, he can help himself to fruit and muffins and whatever’s left of yesterday’s coffee. Or, you know, pour some cereal into a bowl, figure out the microwave, whatever. Hell, if I were to get up one morning and find that someone had decided to fire up the stovetop and make waffles, I WOULDN’T COMPLAIN. 

But usually I get in there at seven and Robespierre is having an orange or a grapefruit and looking vaguely apologetic about it. So I make him coffee, you know? And we sit for a while, reading. He writes in his notebook. We talk a little bit in our mutually-inadequate French and English. I think he would like to have a newspaper but they seriously aren’t ready for current world events. See above, re: grocery store breakdowns. Saint-Just is another morning person, only unlike Robespierre he’s as hungry as any big active twenty-something. He’s figured out how to use the toaster without creating a fire hazard, God bless him. Another point in his favor: if I don’t offer to put together eggs or bacon he doesn’t ask. He’s no trouble, really, as long as it’s just him and Robespierre. They talk together. It’s…it’s a touching scene, really. The one of them all gangly long legs, stowing away quantities of scrambled eggs or oatmeal or buttered toast like a trooper; the other small and tidy with his carefully-peeled orange.

Marat is generally the next one down, if he’s coming at all. I think he often creeps down in the wee hours and grabs something from the refrigerator to take back to his room. I don’t get the impression he sleeps much, Marat. He doesn’t seem to need it. But if he does happen to join us for breakfast he always has to make some little jab about the luxury of coffee or oranges or clean dishes. Ah yes, the immoral luxury of clean cereal bowls. He wants newspapers too—and isn’t afraid to ask for them.

Desmoulins—no, sorry, _Camille_ —only appears for breakfast if Marat is there. He professes an inability to learn English and requires a translator. I think he also wants an ally. If you put him and Robespierre together alone, all is sweetness and light. Him and Danton, good fun. Camille and Marat, not really a problem even when they argue. Camille and Saint-Just? Oh hell no. Usually it’s Saint-Just who loses his temper first but I have the feeling that if I understood their French better I’d be blaming Desmoulins. Anyway, he’s usually late to breakfast, waiting for Marat or waiting until the others have left the field. Breakfast is coffee, at least three cups. He drinks a lot of coffee. Sometimes he cries about coffee. I’d be annoyed but christ, he probably has a point. Danton told me once, angrily, that “the poor little bastard misses his wife and so do I.”

Danton doesn’t come down for breakfast. When I explained that I was available to help with it until nine-thirty, he said, and this is a direct quote, “Fuck that. I’m not a slave to my desk now, I don’t need to be up till noon.”


	4. At least they're clean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I still disinfect the kitchen thoroughly at least once a day.

I’d like to say that you never know what’s going to astonish the historicals, but it’s only partly true. Some things you can predict. They’re all pre-magical-revolution, by definition, so there’s that, though the ones who had seen the first electric lights and horseless carriages often expect more. “All right, so you can raise the dead and power the east coast off just two or three smallish facilities with none of the grime of coal. But where’s my flying carpet?” But it’s generally a safe bet that they’ll all like refrigeration and flush toilets and clean sidewalks.   
  
Marat, unsurprisingly, appreciates modern medical advances. He says now and then that he might pursue a medical career again, but he says a lot of things. I assume he mostly just welcomes the treatment for his condition. The doctors tell me it’s not contagious. They promise. I still disinfect the kitchen _really thoroughly_ every day. And he gets a bathroom to himself. Speaking of which—sometimes with historicals it’s a bit of a pain getting them used to the idea that you can, you know, wash your whole body every day. Every other day. At least once a week? But thank God the French of the late 18th century had started looking into this whole bath business again after that lull in the Middle Ages. This crew, they’re not bad. Nothing like that Tudor situation a couple of years ago. Oh, GOD, the Tudor situation.  
  
Anyway, where was I?  Right, the stuff that historicals like.  Desmoulins is big on the coffeemakers.  We’ve got two—a Keurig thing and your basic office whatchamacallit coffeemaker.  And some other things kicking around—a French press, a carafe-and-filter deal, I don’t know.  I’m not a coffee snob, I just like to have something hot and strong in the morning.  Anyway, these guys love their coffee and Camille is just fascinated that you can push a button and get hot mocha.  I dug up a biography on him to supplement the case file (all this stuff is kept locked in my room; no one really benefits from reading his own biography) and it describes the Desmoulins’ household as containing “innumerable” coffeepots.  Innumerable.  That’s a lot of coffeepots.  Plus coffee-mills, coffee roasting things, other coffee paraphernalia.  So I guess it’s not surprising that he’s pretty into our Keurig.  Only then he’ll start crying about it sometimes because it makes him think about his wife.  I guess I mentioned that already.  It’s just…I mean…it’s really awkward because, you know, what do you say?  It’s a little too soon to break out the “you’ll meet other people” speech.  So you want to be annoyed because there’s this grown-ass man crying in the kitchen but…yeah.  Fuck it.  We kind of all pretend it isn’t happening, except I’m pretty sure one time Danton hit him.  Yeah.  That was right before the "he misses his wife and so do I" comment and I don't even know.  
  
Robespierre.  Robespierre likes the dog park.  I took them over to Danehy Park in Cambridge one time when we had a warmish spell—everyone was getting antsy and that place has a lot of room, you can see all kinds of people there but it’s not all crowded in—and the whole dog park idea amazed him.  At first, you know, he was all “why can’t they just run free” but after we talked about the mess and stuff—and good God are they amazed by how clean our streets are—he sort of lit up at the idea that people had made special parks for dogs.  I mean, the guy kind of glowed.  And he just wanted to sit and watch for a while.  Then the big snowstorm hit and we haven’t been back because, yeah, thirty inches of snow.  But yeah.  The Incorruptible likes dog parks.    
  
If I don’t hear anything about them getting sent to France soon, I think I’m just going to move on to showing them the internet.


	5. Daily Plans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Necromancy Enforcement Agency guidelines require at least half an hour of exercise time for Historical Reintegration clients daily.

I don't know what to do with Saint-Just.  I mean, I don't know what to do with any of them, I wake up every morning and wonder where I went wrong with my life, but then I usually say fuck it and go review the Daily Plan I came up with the night before.  And it's not like Saint-Just gives me more trouble than the others.  Less, really.  He eats his meals without complaint, he keeps his nervous breakdowns to himself if he has them, he's healthy.  But...it's like this.  The only time I've seen him look happy is when we had that huge snowstorm and I asked for a couple of volunteers to help shovel.  It was him and me and Danton, and the kid was just plugging away through that snow and he started whistling under his breath for a little bit and he looked...happy.  He even grinned back at me when we happened to catch each other's eyes.  Then the neighbors came out and started doing their driveway with the snowblower, and he looked over at how much he'd done in twenty minutes and how much they'd done in two, and his face kind of closed up.  
  
Danton asked why we didn't have one of those, and could we borrow theirs.  I said I didn't know how to use one, which is actually true.  My parents were believers in clearing the sidewalk the old-fashioned way.   
  
The Daily Plan usually has a half-hour group walk scheduled in, when we don't have something else going on.   But they're just not ready yet for me to say "hey, here's the housekeys, here's a map, be back in time for supper," you know?  I just see so much potential disaster.  Getting lost.  Running away.  Walking in front of a bus.  Staring at the wrong people.  Suddenly collapsing into a state of paralytic terror at the realization they've been dead more than two hundred years and they don't know anybody in the world and everyone they ever loved has been forgotten.  Trying to buy something at the Dunkin' Donuts and not having the right change. Yeah, yeah, I'm a worrier.  (When I'm trying to be nice to myself I prefer the term "protective.")   
  
Saint-Just asked me if he was a prisoner the other day.  Kind of a heated conversation, not rendered humorous by my poor French.  We were in the kitchen, one of those breakfast scenes, and I found myself looking over to Robespierre for support.  Which is unprofessional.  You don't want to play favorites, set up rivalries, anything like that.  But I looked over to Robespierre anyway and he was just sort of watching.  So I said "Yes, you can say that if you want."  I was ready to just put on my Big Meany Meanypants Pants and be hated for a while--it happens--but I wasn't really ready for Marat to be there.  I think Robespierre had been watching _him_ , actually, over my shoulder.  In the doorway.  
  
I couldn't catch everything Marat said.  He can be a theatrical little bastard and I'm sure he was speaking extra-slow for my benefit but I'm still too dumb to follow all their conversations.  It was something, you know, smart and cynical and angry, something totally Marat: something about how they were dangerous, like ideas, and couldn't be...I don't know.  Something about contagion?  
  
I'll talk to him about it.   
  
Later.


	6. These are café people, right?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There is an incident.

Some day I’ll write up one of these posts sober.  I don’t mean that I’m drunk right now, or that I’m drunk very often.  But I only get the chance to do this after I’ve put the French Revolution to bed and retreated to my lair to put together my day’s notes and the plan for the next day.  My lair: I have a lock to my door, and behind it I keep the television, the laptop, the case files and biographies.  My stash of beers.  I do my homework and then finally I give myself time to screw around online...and write this, my informal version of the day’s notes.  So I always have a drink at my elbow when I’m doing this.  
  
We had an Incident today.  Danton escaped.  We were shoveling snow--again--not a big storm but a heavy, sloppy three or four inches.  I’m out at the garage end of the driveway, Danton’s supposed to be doing the front steps and the sidewalk. (Hey, he volunteered. This time Saint-Just did not.  I think he still resents the neighbors’ snowblower.)  So I’m working my way from the garage down the driveway, I stop to take off my scarf, I don’t hear any Dantonly shoveling sounds.  I figure he’s just taking a break, I get back to work, I heave a few more loads of this nasty back-breaking snow over to the side, I suddenly think _uh-oh, what if..._  
  
I’m always thinking things that start with _uh-oh, what if..._ It’s part of my job.  So I put down my shovel and slog over to see what’s up.  And--yeah, I know, you already got this--what’s up is a shovel tossed into a snowbank and a distinct lack of Danton.  And I mean, you know, he’s hard to overlook.  You don’t just misplace Georges-Jacques Danton.  French guy, about so tall, big voice, looks like he got maybe gored in the face by bulls a couple of times?  
  
Seeing as he probably had at least a twenty minute head start on me I didn’t figure it was worth running after him alone.  I go back to the house and grab Desmoulins’ coat and put him into it and haul him along with me.  (Anyway, it probably felt like that to him.  He’d been writing at the kitchen table and suddenly the horrible hated tyrant American was saying something about Danton and going outside, _yes in this weather_ , and then he’s sitting in the horrible hated magical carriage thing.)  I ignore protests.  He’s Danton’s friend, or something close enough to it.  The only one here. Do you imagine Robespierre talking Danton into a peaceful return?  
  
We're SOL if he's gone somewhere unexpected so I start with the places I've already taken the group.  Coffee-shop first.  It says CAFÉ on the front in big letters and these are café people, right?  Plus it's easy to search, I mean, there's the front and there's the back.  No Danton in the café.  No Danton in the laundromat next door, because why the hell would you run away to a laundromat, but it's another place that's easy to check.  (I remember looking at the bulletin board there with all the FUTON FOR SALE and HAVE YOU SEEN MY CAT notices and thinking I should put one up myself.  LOST REVOLUTIONARY.)  
  
So I drag Camille across the street to the library.  They know us there.  I take the guys there pretty often.  I ask at the reference desk--and thank the fucking _lord_ , yes, sure, they saw Danton come in.  "Julie said she'd help him--he was looking for something in the stacks.  She should be getting back soon, they've been a little while...Do you want me to go look for them?"  
  
...No, no.  That's okay.  We'll just, we'll just catch our breaths and look like we weren't panicking.  I'll do that, anyway.  Camille can just look smug.  And start laughing when we find Danton talking to Julie, who is obviously doing most of the question-asking.  Danton is leaning with a shoulder up against the bookshelf, a thumb hooked comfortably in the corner of his pocket, gesturing a bit with the other hand, making a show of keeping his voice down for the (young, amused) librarian.  You could put him in a courthouse or the corner bar.   
  
And you know what, I'd been wondering when I'd see that Danton.   
  
Not that I didn't go collect him immediately, of course. (By collecting him I mean walking up and clearing my throat in a passive-aggressive way while Camille Desmoulins continued to have himself a good laugh at the end of the stacks.)  He put his arm over my shoulder, nodded to Camille to come over (which he did, with alacrity, his face absolutely lit up), and made friendly introductions.  "Julie, Camille; Camille, Julie.  Julie, my kind-hearted jailor; Jailor, Julie.  Julie was helping me find a good novel.  But she says I need a card--yes? a library card?  Always something that needs a signature, hey?  My God, when they signed my death-warrant the first thing I thought was ' _Enfin_ , the last piece of paper.'"  
  
So now Danton has a library card, and so does Desmoulins because we couldn't possibly leave Camille out, now could we.  And I don't have to write out a report about it because we're all home safe and sound and there isn't an NEA form for being made to feel like an idiot.  
  
We have to go back to the library tomorrow.  Now _everyone_ wants a card.


	7. I was an undergrad history major once.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our narrator needs a vacation, or perhaps a little intellectual rigor.

Anyone reading these...posts, journal entries, whatever they are...would be seriously disappointed, wouldn't they. Everything seems so muffled up, I mean, all I write about is me running around like a nanny. (More of a soccer mom, really, I mean, I've got the big maroon minivan and everything.) It probably reads like I keep these guys in plastic packaging, like some kind of action figures that I hope will be worth something in twenty years. Or maybe wrapped in those wads of cotton that go in bottles of aspirin. Where's the confrontation between Danton and Robespierre? Can Robespierre and Desmoulins forgive one another? What does Marat think about the world now? Where's the politics? Where's--where's the _revolution?_

_  
_Serioustalk: I do not want a revolution.

_  
_Robespierre and Saint-Just talk: quietly, in their rooms.  Occasional outbursts from Saint-Just, quickly stifled.   Marat lectures Camille, and I pick up some words here and there--the people, the republic, the future--but Camille looks like he's shutting down whatever he wants to say in reply.  Danton gives no fucks about any of them, as far as I can tell.  He wants to find a girl, have a drink.  He reads novels.  He pretends to be asleep when Robespierre comes into the living room.  Robespierre and Camille talk quietly too, when Saint-Just isn't around.  I said before it was all sweetness and light there but the more I see the more fragile I think that particular truce is.

  
I do not want a revolution and I want this fragile truce to last.  I want France to ask for these guys back soon.  Otherwise I can't keep them in their original packaging--no, that's what it is, keeping them in protective sleeves, like comic books.  There's another metaphor for you.  How many are we up to?  Let's look at this here metaphor.  (Gonna get another beer first.)  I am protecting my comic-book revolutionaries.  Comic-book history, the shallowest version of history.  I take them out from time to time so that I can very carefully read their stylized trimmed-down comic-book dialog, right?  Maybe let someone else take a peek--the librarian, their doctor, the shrink that comes to see them twice a week. It's not just because I'm some kind of moral and intellectual coward, though.  I mean, this is my job.  I think I'm good at my job.  Yes, I am protecting them.  Protecting them from mental breakdown, from exploitation, from strains of the common cold their immune systems haven't run into yet.  

 

It's just that it's not a very good job.  Instead of saying "you're the guys that waste our tax money on Hitlers," someone should be saying "you're the guys that could be talking to the people who made history and instead you're teaching them to bag groceries."  


	8. Hey I did my research.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It is suggested that I try actually talking to these guys. About something other than the dishwasher and laundry detergent.

Dr. Robineau: revolutionary therapist, manager of neurotic NEA baby-sitters. She’s my hero.  
  
The thing is, okay, someone from the eighteenth century isn’t going to know what the hell you’re talking about if you suggest a therapist, and if you explained it they’d be pretty damned offended. The thing is also, though, someone from the eighteenth century dragged into the present after a violent death is seriously in need of a therapist. We represent it as someone helping them integrate their memories. That’s true, actually: resurrection results in memory loss and confusion (who would have thought). So as far as they’re concerned, this nice Haitian lady comes twice a week to take down notes about what they can recall and help them hunt down some of the hazy areas, and if they end up telling her about their mommy issues or melancholic prostration or whatever that’s just a side effect. Anyway, she’s my hero, she’s a super smart woman, very cool. The Agency is very lucky that we happened to have a French-speaking therapist right here on hand. I hope the guys treat her okay. She says they do.  
  
So she was here yesterday and I kind of had that whole little journal-outburst still in my mind, you know, the whole “I’m a terrible failure at life, I’m suppressing the revolution, I’m a fraud, how can I participate in the conversion of the leaders of the French Revolution into burger-flippers or grocery cart herders or at the very best talk-show color commentary guys” thing.  I sort of brought it up to her and she’s probably used to people trying to sneak in some free therapy sessions because she listened sympathetically.  And she said “Well, why don’t you talk to them about it?”  
  
This should not be a daunting prospect.  But I got all shifty-eyed:  
  
“I do talk to them!  I talk to Robespierre all the time at breakfast.”  
“Ye-es, he mentioned it.  He said you talk about the weather, and that you had a fascinating conversation about where oranges are grown in the United States. It was very informative, he said.  And the conversation about grapefruits, that was informative too.”  
  
Yeah, okay, point taken.  There could be a little more personal substance.  So I did my research and today I hunted down Camille when he was alone in the kitchen (coffee).  And I made a speech.  In my head it was _the very good French_ but I'm pretty sure this is how it came out:

  
"HAPPY BIRTHDAY. I HAVE LEARNED IT IS YOUR BIRTHDAY. I DO NOT KNOW VERY MUCH ON THE CUSTOMS OF THE CELEBRATION OF THE BIRTHDAY IN YOUR COUNTRY BUT HERE WE GIVE SOME CAKES OR SOME CUPCAKES WITH A CANDLE. ALSO WE SING A SONG BUT I HAVE THE RATHER BAD VOICE AND IT IS EMBARRASSING.  SO HERE THIS IS A CUPCAKE, I HAVE ONE TOO.  YOU MAKE A WISH AND BLOW UPON THE CANDLE. THERE ARE MORE CUPCAKES IN THE REFRIGERATOR IF YOU WANT. PERHAPS ROBESPIERRE WOULD LIKE ONE, OR DANTON, OR SOMEONE AND I AM SORRY I WILL STOP TALKING NOW."  He stared at me like I had escaped from an asylum but hey, we ate our cupcakes and he said polite things about it.  It was pretty damn good, actually, I got them from the fancy cake shop.  They have coffee buttercream(? is that the word I don't know arcane cupcake terminology) frosting with a little salted caramel drizzled on top, and a chocolate-covered coffee-bean.

 

I feel like it's a start.  


	9. Communication skills

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our hero needs to learn to negotiate better. (Nod to coldhope for "how's the exudate" and a borrowed doctor.)

“I want a library friend too.” It’s an odd line to walk in on (but still better than the stuff between Marat and his dermatologist, please God I never want to hear “how’s the exudate” and “the blistering has reduced perceptibly in the suprapubic region” again, why do you people continue your private conversations into the living room and kitchen, next time I am going to put my fingers in my ears and go NOPE NOPE NOPE) and it took me a little minute to parse.  Camille was looking at Danton with an expression I’m gonna go ahead and call saintly.  “You met Julie first, that’s fair, but I don’t see why you have to talk like that to _all_ the girls there.”

  
Time to intervene, but it took me a little while to muster the French: “You know, we do not wait at—um, no, I mean—we do not attend at the library to meet girls.  It is not the, the, the Palais-Royal.”  Camille turned the (acidic) saintly look on me.  “Oh, M. le Geôlier, your French does improve.  But you might simply say ‘go;’ one could just ‘go’ to the library.  And it’s the Palais-Égalité now.”

“Probably not any more, Camille.”  That was Danton; and after he said it Camille’s smile froze up into something…despairing?  Sometimes I feel like dealing with these people, writing about them, takes this whole new emotional and philosophical vocabulary, and I’m not just talking about brushing up on my French.  Anyway, dude looked sad.  So I sat down at the table with them—this is the kitchen again, most everything happens in the kitchen, I don’t know why—I sat down at the table with them to talk. 

  
“Okay.  Guys, look.”  English now: I figured Danton could fill Camille in later if he really couldn’t understand; it’s hard to tell how much he picks up.  “You’re bored.  You’re lonely.  Your revolution…I mean, you don’t have much to do these days—” 

Camille interruption: “He said revolution, what else is he saying, Georges?”  Danton waved him quiet.  But yeah, what _was_ I saying? “So I don’t mind heading out to the library every day, the café, whatever.  And tell you what, you can have guests over.  During the day.  Down here in the kitchen or the living room.  Yeah, it sucks having a chaperone but—Jesus, guys, what do you want me to do?”

“Treat us like reasoning men.”

“ _I can’t_.”  Camille and Danton both started to talk at once and I made myself push on.  “I can’t, _yet_ , because here and now you’re, you’re not reasoning men.  Any more than I would be if I were in Paris in 1789 or 1793 or—whenever.  I mean, you’d think I was an idiot, mentally defective.  We don’t understand each other yet, it’s, the way people talk and think—” 

Danton hit the table and swore.  I know I flinched and I’m pretty sure Camille did too.  “So we have to stay in your fucking _kitchen_ until we learn somehow to be what you call men?  Only _fucking_ is precisely the wrong word for it, this convent life might be all right for someone like—” 

Camille’s turn to interrupt, thank God.  Obviously he wasn’t going to shout over Danton but he reached across him to catch his wrist.  “This is a marvelous noise we’re having”—and by the way, these guys have some great words, why don’t we say things like _charivari_ in English?—“but would someone please tell me what we’re talking about?”

  
I let the two of them _discuss_ while I nuked some hot water for tea in the microwave.  I felt like tea was maybe better than coffee for the moment.  (Incidentally, yeah, I’m sure I’m kind of making some of the conversation up, it’s not like I remember exact words, but this is more or less how it went down.)  I didn’t even try to listen to them.  Because yeah, I mean, I just told them they didn’t even count as reasoning people, that’s got to hurt, I figured it was only fair to give them some privacy.  When I got back to the table with tea (for three) Danton had got his hand back from Camille but had also stopped shouting.

“Sorry.  You guys were just joking around about meeting women—” “Camille, he thinks we were joking.” “—joking around about meeting women, and I turned your conversation into something we didn’t mean to get into.”   “We didn’t?” “…I didn’t.” “ _That_ , I believe.”  Camille’s eyes were darting back and forth again, between us.  “Right.  So some of my stupid rules are actually not so stupid, but…whatever, forget that.  We’ll work on it, okay?  I’ll figure out which ones I can bend for—for some reasoning adults.  Yeah?  And which ones don’t bend.”

At which point Danton said that we could consider it a deal, and I thought _fuck me, I’m bargaining with Danton_.  And only later did it occur to me that I was bargaining with Danton and _I didn’t even get anything._

I heard some line once, I don’t know if he ever said it or if it’s one of those apocryphal history moments, but it went “You can pay Danton 80,000 livres but you can’t buy him for 80,000.”  I’m going to have to figure out what 80,000 livres comes to now…and what currency I even have. 


	10. First concession

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They should be able to handle it by now.

Concession: newspaper.  Price: anyone who wants to read it has to haul his ass out of bed before noon.  Seriously, if Danton needs more beauty rest (…) he can go to sleep earlier, and if he wants to read the paper he can get down here before I put it in the recycling bin.

I’ve got us scheduled for paper delivery now but this first one I jogged out (zombie-shuffled out) to fetch at five in the morning.  I don’t know, I couldn’t sleep.  It was cold and smooth on the breakfast table for Robespierre and Saint-Just by the time they got there.  (digression: I feel so much like my parents now, pretty soon I’ll be grumbling if the paper gets here late, and I tell you I remember when the Globe was a _real_ newspaper with international news on the front page instead of all this local stuff, but what do you expect since the New York Times bought it out, it’s not like they’re going to be encouraging its flourishing growth…but the website is good and why am I even stressing about the paper product?) (also why the hell do they run _Dustin,_ worst comic strip ever)

Uh.  So they were impressed.  First by its size.  So much paper!  A man who buys this would be rich in paper, just think, he could wrap his meat from the butcher’s or his fish, start fires for a week or more, and it’s soft stuff, you could fill a little rough mattress with it if you didn’t have anything else… I think that’s the drift of what they were saying.  Mostly Saint-Just.  He may be kind of a pain to deal with sometimes but (because?) he does engage himself fully in the modern experience.  (That phrase comes from NEA publications.)  But since no one goes to a fish-woman and wraps fish in paper to take home, it all seems a little irrelevant.

I showed them the separate components of the paper: Front and Metro and Sports, all of it.  Sports?  Yes, Sports.  Robespierre and Saint-Just between them can muster a really fucking _withering_ Dubious Look.  I grabbed that section myself, which is pointless since I don’t do more than, you know, nod approvingly when my friends point out that the Bruins or the Red Sox are doing well.  Something about that Dubious Look made me want to make some kind of point.  Or something.

After I remembered how much I don’t care about spring training I went and started making pancakes.  When they were done I had to slide the plates between newspaper sections and French-English dictionaries and the Columbia Encyclopedia.  (Again, I’m turning into my parents.  When I was a kid any questions at the dinner table had to be settled with a trip to the OED or the Columbia Encyclopedia. Signs you’re coming from a place of privilege.)  Then I wedged a couple of glasses of OJ into place, and butter and syrup, all that stuff.  With Robespierre you have to actually put the food where he can see it and mention that it’s there, or else he’s likely to forget.  I now believe the anecdote about him serving soup onto the tablecloth because he didn’t notice there wasn’t a bowl.

I don’t know if Marat smelled the newspaper or the breakfast first but he hustled down pretty quick and commandeered whatever sections the others didn’t have.  More pancakes.  More OJ.  Does he say thank you?  No, he does not.  Does he want me to explain the entire history of gun ownership laws in America?  Yes, he does.  Is the entire history of gun ownership laws in America my responsibility?  Apparently it is.  Do I think I should be prepared at any moment to take a place in an armed insurrection?  What the fuck, Marat, what the fuck, it is too early for this.  

Concession: newspaper.  Price: getting up before noon…next time.  This first one, it can stay here for a while to be found, whatever is left of it by the time Camille and Danton show up.  The three men at the table are already picking it apart like crows.


	11. That encyclopedia weighs a ton, just so you know.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More newspaper.

On the great Newspaper Morning, Desmoulins wandered down for breakfast at about 11:45 looking very unappealing.  I mean, seriously, he was shuffling around in his bathrobe (some time I need to write up about the clothing situation, but anyway, it can wait), not shaved, glaring at everything.  Before he even touched the Keurig he went to the closet and fetched out a scarf to wrap around his neck.  Marat looked him over dispassionately (check out my flourishing vocabulary) and said "Tonsils again.  I told him before he should have them taken out.  He declined.  --Camille, look, we have a newspaper."  I wonder if Marat offered to do the tonsillectomy himself. Oral Surgery Hour With Jean-Paul Marat.  I said I'd call the doctor and settled in to make more pancakes even though Personal Breakfast Servant time was long over.  It gave me an excuse to hang out.

I'm not sure Camille 100% loved having a chunk of newspaper thrust into his face but he did a good-enough job of looking interested.  (Only about half the newspaper.  Saint-Just and Robespierre took the rest upstairs with them to dissect in privacy.)  Marat had already marked down articles for his review and begun translating portions.  I slid pancakes and tea (better for a sore throat than coffee) into place around them like I did for the early-morning breakfast crowd. 

By the time I was done talking to the Agency doctor (able to make a house call for us this evening, no problem, tell your little revolutionary not to worry--we've progressed beyond bloodletting and purgatives) the unhappy murmurs from the breakfast table had turned serious.  What is this Associated Press? What are its politics?  What is this sentence, "red wine ingredient's antiaging ability backed by study," how do you _read_ this mess? Health care vote at issue, how do you vote about health? This man is your president? What kind of name is--

"He's from Hawaii," is what I said, by way of evasion.  "Why don't you start with the editorials, Camille.  And stop trying to talk if your throat hurts.  Marat, just give him a minute, can't you?  He hasn't even finished his breakfast."  "He's _had_ a minute.  He's had two months, there's no point in his sitting here uselessly, eating up your food without an idea in his head.  Camille, forget that, read this one." 

Camille took the paper.  "Mirabeau told me his parents fought all the time; I used to wonder what it would be like.  Thank you both for the education.  May I bring this upstairs?  I _don't_ feel well."

Which effectively disappointed both of us.  Turns out I actually _wanted_ to hear what he had to say about...I dunno, health care reform.  Which I barely understand myself.  I'm still sneaking up on current events by way of understanding history.  Israel and Palestine?  Totally fucking paralyzing to my mind beyond some vague "why can't we all get along" bullshit (is that bullshit, I don't know, but it's obviously inadequate).  Events of 1789?  I'm getting a good handle on that!  1793?  Working hard on it!  Latin America in the 20th and 21st century?  Infinitely more bewildering, feelings of guilt, let's keep busy making pancakes for dead guys.  Maybe if I have kids (unlikely, let's face it) _they_ can figure shit out.

After lunch (lunch for Marat and Saint-Just; Danton, Robespierre, and Desmoulins no-shows) I lugged the Columbia Encyclopedia upstairs.  First stop: second floor, Robespierre's room.  Did he need the Encyclopedia?  Another dictionary?  Oh, an atlas and the bigger Larousse?  Sure.  Downstairs (Encyclopedia left on the landing) and up again with more reference material.  Polite thanks.  Do I happen to know when Venezuela became independent from Spain?  Um.  Eighteen-something?  Encyclopedia says 1811, 1821, and 1830.  I guess it's complicated.  No problem, you're welcome.

Third floor with the Encyclopedia.  It turns out Danton was a no-show for lunch because Desmoulins had roped him into reading out loud from the newspaper and translating.  In fact, Desmoulins looked like he was comfortably half-asleep. _They_ didn't need an Encyclopedia.  Back downstairs. 

Anyway, Robespierre did want the Encyclopedia after all.  So I was useful.  In kind of an anticlimactic way.  Forget "petty, and yet whimsically fantastical," I'm pretty sure "useful in kind of an anticlimactic way" is my new lifestyle.

Oh, and yeah, the doctor says the tonsils might have to come out, which is going to be an argument, but we're trying antibiotics first.  And they get their next round of vaccinations in two weeks and after _that_ I'm supposed to get everybody to the dentist, which is basically going to be like...eheh, like pulling teeth.  Maybe I can read about the world news in the waiting room, right?  Yeah?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't generally get into diagnosing historical figures but Desmoulins seems to have complained pretty frequently of tonsilitis and quinsy (one time I looked this up and then forgot I had that tab and surprised myself a few hours later with horrifying GIANT ABSCESSED TONSIL PICTURES, just thought I should warn you). Probably a lousy recurring sort of thing.


	12. later i looked up that mirabeau quote and it's kind of disturbing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Feelings are had, but let's not look too close.

Okay, see that caution there?  And see that wind?  I have thrown the one to the other! 

what, it’s an expression, throw caution to the wind

So that sounded better in my head.  See, I figured I’ve been writing too many of these things up sober and anyway maybe i should do that again but THROWING CAUTION TO THE WIND right.

By which I mean I showed the guys the internet.  It’s not like they’ve never _seen_ a laptop, but as far as I know they haven’t seen one put through its paces.  The joke is I’m pretty damned incompetent, practically a Luddite, I barely even text anyone ever but whatever, I can make my magic toy play music and show pictures and talk to people and ~~laboriously draw penises to send to my friends’ work emails when they forget to invite me to trivia night~~ make beautiful art.

I’m kind of breaking some rules here but I mean…these guys are smart, they can adapt.  And the NEA got a kind of weird and equivocal-ish communication from our French counterparts about how they’re “reviewing and reconsidering” some policies so they want us to hang on to their revolution for a little while.  Anyway that’s how I interpreted it.  How I interpreted my boss’s memo about it.

So screw it, I had fun showing off.  I pulled up Grooveshark, threw together the most ridiculous mix of music.  We’ve got a radio so that wasn’t crazily new or anything but I had a good time.  I showed them Wikipedia (the day had to come eventually), I showed them my ex’s art-history blog (not a stalker I swear, we’re pretty friendly), I took pictures of the kitchen and posted them to my tumblr (hardly any followers, maybe pictures of my kitchen is why), I messaged my mother on Facebook and we had a chat (HEY MOM ROBESPIERRE SAYS HI, come on, you’ve always wanted a chance to say that for real).  Basically a bunch of dumbshit, messing around until I felt like I was losing them.  Then I just brought up the Delacroix _Liberty guiding the people_ so they could have something static to look at and process instead of the aforementioned short-attention-span zillion-things-at-once stuff.  Or maybe to show them that my pretty toy had something worthwhile to it.

But maybe that was dumb too?  I don’t know.  They spent a long time looking at it.  I mean, some of them did.  Desmoulins muttered something that took me way too long to put together but it was more or less “Like Mirabeau said, a bed of corpses.”  And then the tiny mini-truce between him and Saint-Just looked like it was going to be over again (basically they are never in the same room at the same time now which I should be doing something about I guess—but why should I really) until Danton interrupted to insist that I change the music again.  It was a good hint and I pulled up the first not-new thing I spotted on my iTunes.  Some Bach thing my dad sent me that I haven’t listened to yet because I have no culture (see above for _ex_ and art history).  And then people kind of drifted away to have complicated feelings about things, I guess.  Camille left the room, and Robespierre went after him.  Marat took out some papers that Camille gave him this morning, Danton raided the fridge.  Saint-Just sat down to stare at _Liberty._

Anyway obviously I kind of screwed up in some sense, with the whole “hey, hey guys, hey guys look i have art for you, it is art about liberty, see i can be cool too” move.  I should be more upset because there were feelings, as mentioned.  But…look, it’s been a couple of weeks since Robespierre and Camille even talked to each other beyond polite things if they meet at lunch.  I don’t really know what happened.  I mean, I know what happened a couple hundred years ago, I just don’t know what happened in the last month.  But Camille went off and Robespierre went to talk to him and they were still talking when I went upstairs with a thermos full of tea and Camille’s antibiotics. 

Where was I going with this post?  Maybe I should go back to writing these up sober.  But it’s not like they’re going public anywhere.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mirabeau said that "liberty is a bitch that likes to be fucked on a bed of corpses." Much later, in No. 6 of the Vieux Cordelier, Desmoulins mentions that, commenting "I suspect that he spoke thus of liberty not to make us love her but to make us fear her."


	13. No one complained about the snowblower this time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our nice neighbor comes to visit.

So me and Saint-Just were at work shoveling snow again this morning.  Thirteen inches of this godawful snow, the stuff was like concrete.  We started off fine, kind of humming under our breaths the way you do, but this stuff just made you want to give up on life.  (March, stop being a jerk.  You suck, March.  You suck.)  I was thinking I’d have to draft more help, forget relying on volunteers.  And then, _and then_ , like a serene middle-class retiree angel of mercy, our neighbor came slogging along through the yard and leaned over the fence.  “Would you boys like me to do your driveway with the snowblower?  It’s no trouble, this stuff is terrible!”  See?  Angel of mercy.

So we hung around looking stupid while our nice neighbor finished off the barricade the snowplows had left at the end of the driveway.  And then, speaking of miracles, when she was done Saint-Just performed the best bow you can manage in a Lands’-End parka and asked if we could offer madame some coffee or chocolate as thanks.

I think she had to struggle a little with his accent, but “coffee” and “chocolate” are hard to miss and she was clearly dying to come in and see what the hell goes on in a Necromancy Enforcement Agency home.  Which she knows we are.  Sometimes we get her mail by mistake and sometimes she gets ours. 

I led the way into the house, scouting the kitchen for…I dunno.  It’s not like anything too depraved goes on around here, much to some people’s disappointment.  But Camille has been roaming around in his bathrobe sucking passive-aggressively on throat lozenges, and Marat has some medical books out from the library that he tends to leave open to full-color surgery pictures.  (He only does it to annoy, because he knows it teases.) So I scouted ahead and was glad to see the coast was clear, looked (sounded) like Marat and Camille were in the living-room with some papers, arguing about whatever they argue about.  Robespierre was at the laptop, which was a little unexpected but I have the parental controls on so nothing too crazy can turn up.  They’ve all been learning how to mess around with iTunes. 

…which is a long-winded way of saying that nothing was going wrong.  So our neighbor came in.  I made introductions.  Mrs. Pignatelli, M. Robespierre, M. Saint-Just.  Coffee?  Hot chocolate?  Tea?  Tea.  Can do.  I’m kind of used to people getting a funny look on their faces when introductions happen, so I just scooted off to make tea and let everyone settle in.  Mrs. Pignatelli said something along the lines of “My goodness, I had no idea you were from France,” with one of those just-long-enough-to-be-noticeable, was-gonna-say-something-else-oops pauses, but she rescued the moment with a quick follow-up, “How do you like Arlington,” kind of question thing.  And small talk proceeds.  After a few minutes Camille showed up (having decided to shed the bathrobe in favor of a clean shirt, thank you) and made himself agreeable and amusing in some kind of French-English hybrid language and a lot of gestures, which makes me wonder why he has to be a jerk most days when he obviously knows how not to be.

Anyway, it seemed pretty chill to me.  When the tea was all drunk up I walked Mrs. P. back out to her snowblower.  She seemed sort of _meaningful_ when she said what polite young men they all were.  Not meaningful in a weird way, just surprised?  And kind of…dubious?  I was pretty oblivious (and tired, to be fair, what with the whole snow thing) until I got back in and Robespierre was sort of neatly and politely brooding alone in the kitchen.  I guess not brooding.  Fretting?  Polishing his glasses thoughtfully? (note to self: R, C, and M have eye-doctor app’ts Monday)

I start washing the dishes and he says, “I know I haven’t asked many questions.”  Which is not true, he asks a lot of questions, e.g. _where do they grow oranges in America, where is Brooklyn, what is the MSPCA, what is a bagel, did you consider this George Bush to be a good president?_ But anyway I said “um” in an encouraging way while he polished his glasses some more.  “I haven’t asked about…the history of our revolution.”  I was scrubbing the mugs and thinking I should really just put them in the dishwasher and ignore the tannin stains because who cares really, so I sort of stood there with suds creeping down my arm.  “Um.  Yeah, I…I guess you haven’t.  I mean, um.”

I’m just throwing these details in so you get the picture of my social and intellectual abilities.  Summary: Robespierre wants to know how people see the French Revolution these days.

“Because it seemed—perhaps I am mistaken—it seemed that Mme. Pignatelli was alarmed to meet us.”  I get back to scrubbing mugs.  “Well…um.  I mean, every school is different, teachers have different ways of…” “Naturally.”  “I think people kind of, kind of try to simplify things?”  “Naturally.”  “I mean…so like in college, university-level, those courses are different but I guess in high school it’s…I mean, they cover that the people were very unhappy and how important it was to change things.” “It’s true.” “Yes. Yes, it…yeah.”

He’s looking very polite.  Very patient.  “…I’m sorry.  I’m sorry, people are dumb, and it all got turned into ‘there needed to be a revolution but then everything went crazy and they killed all the aristocrats and cut off everyone’s head until—until Robespierre was overthrown, and then somehow Napoleon turned up and had an empire.’  I’m sorry.”  And goddammit he’s _still_ looking very polite.  “I’m sorry, Robespierre.  People are stupid.”

“Oh, no.  You shouldn’t say that.”  But they are, I mean, I have a fucking Master’s degree and I’m dumb as hell.  Which I didn’t say, because who cares.  “Well.  Thank you.  I appreciate your honesty.  I imagine they call me a dictator?” 

I start falling all over myself to qualify what I just said, you know, it’s different at the university level (sort of, sometimes) and _I_ don’t think that and at least everyone agrees that things were really bad before the revolution, and…stupid bullshit like that which does not help someone who’s just had it confirmed that everyone in the world (including our nice neighbor) probably thinks he’s an evil dictator.  So I shut up. 

And I wish there were some cool conclusion I could make here.  I wish I could say I burst into the nearest history classroom and lectured for an hour about how wrong the textbooks were and then everyone in the room stood up and clapped, or some other shit_that_didn't_happen.txt. But I said something to him about how he could maybe write something, you know, explaining, but he asked me very seriously who would publish it.  Which I do not know.  Blogs are cool and all but they have limitations, or maybe Dr. Robineau has some connections, or…

Anyway, I said I’d ask my boss about it. And now I'm kind of wondering what those Harvard kiddies had in mind with all this resurrection.


	14. Fleeting interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations on going 2 days without an emotional crisis.

Tomorrow there will be puke on the sidewalks. Not trying to be gross (okay maybe a little gross) but it is the way of things around here. It’s the Greater Boston Area, we do St. Patrick’s Day. So, yeah, if you live near any bars, March 18th is Mind Where You Step Day.

Tomorrow, my boss wants to have a Quick Meeting with me. Just to Touch Base about some things. 

But anyway, it’s still the weekend, it’s just barely the afternoon, I had green bagels out for breakfast to celebrate my Boston Jewish heritage, and I’m on a campaign to create one tiny interlude where no one has any heartbreaks at all. It’s…it’s the weekend of Infinite Jam Tarts: the weekend of Bottomless Coffee: the weekend of Sure You Can Tell Me Everything That’s Wrong With The Newspaper: the weekend of Sleeping In If You Want: the weekend of Let’s Take A Long Brisk Walk Somewhere Or Stay Home Instead If That’s More Your Thing: the weekend of I Bought A Case Of Wine (Just Try Not To Finish It All At Once). 

It’s the weekend where I’m pretending the Supreme Being is in his heaven and all’s right with the world.

I even got us a dog. Borrowed us a dog. Convinced my parents that they needed me to pet-sit Ruby for the weekend. She tried to eat the jam tarts and I’m pretty sure I saw her licking the crumbs off Robespierre’s fingers and goddammit this is an okay weekend.


	15. I didn’t ask my boss about it so she didn’t say no

I feel like there are various not-quite-rules getting not-quite-broken right now.  Let’s see.

  1. I am allowed to exercise my judgment about sending my historicals out into the world on their own, so it isn’t against any rules for me to have given Saint-Just the housekeys and told him to spend as long as he likes at the library, provided he gets back in time to help with another round of shoveling before supper.  (Okay March, we get it, you come in like a lion, you can go out like a lamb now.) (Anyway, Saint-Just can cross the street by himself, I know that for a fact, and I am 99.9% sure he is not simply undertaking some grand scheme to get laid.)
  2. Camille Desmoulins is under no legal obligation to spend all day writing down extracts from the newspaper with Marat.  If he wants to take a day off and watch a movie with Robespierre instead of taking notes or whatever, he can.  Seriously, I don’t get why Marat is so bent out of shape about it.
  3. I have no evidence that Danton smuggled one or more bottles of wine up to his room and anyway since I provided said wine the whole business can be considered to be happening under my supervision.
  4. It is not strictly against any rules for me to be typing this up right now while the guys watch _La Belle et La Bête_ , which by the way they think is pretty damn fantastic, because I didn’t ask my boss about it so she didn’t say no.  She only said to “take it slow” with things like the newspapers, and to limit their computer use to music programs.  And they aren’t using the computer right now even for that.  So there.



I’m still trying to read between the lines with the meeting my boss called.  (Mangled metaphors, get your mangled metaphors right here.)  I’m supposed to take things slow in the newspaper department…while also working more on Life Skills.  The latter sounds to me like we’re expecting to keep these guys here for the long term; the former sounds to me like we’re not supposed to let them get too invested in their place here. 

At least my boss acknowledged that it was a mixed message.  “We’re waiting to hear more from France.”  I asked her what they’ve done in the past with foreign resurrections; she said there haven’t been many.  Only domestic ones.  A Marat turned up in the Ukraine or somewhere like that, a long time ago—or was it really Marat?  He vanished before the French government made any decision.

And does France have many versions of these guys right now, I asked?  They’re a little cagey about it, apparently.  My boss was able to pass on to me that there’s at least one Robespierre living under an assumed identity somewhere (why assumed identity? she couldn’t speak to that) and that there had at one point been a Saint-Just.  (Did they misplace him? leave him in a cab one day by mistake?)  Danton’s fared better: they’ve already got one who makes public appearances, talking to schoolkiddies, that kind of thing (study hard, vive la france).  There may or may not be a Desmoulins—my boss wasn’t sure—and France is quite positive that they don’t have any current Marats.  Nice to know they’re willing to swear to _something_ out of all that.  No current Marats.  They’re very sure that the guy who made a career out of hiding from the authorities in the sewer system isn’t around.

I wonder how the hell I’d find out about that other Robespierre.  I mean, I know it sounds like a cheesy adventure story— _The Case of the Missing Robespierre?_ or is it _The Robespierre That Didn’t Want to be Found_?—but I feel like it might be kind of relevant.  To the guy sitting next to me on the couch right now, smiling all amiably at Belle’s happy ending.


	16. Did I miss something?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maybe he missed something.

“So, what’s with the clementines,” I asked, semi-rhetorically.  Half the conversations in this ridiculous damn house consist of rhetorical questions and passive-aggressive statements directed at the ceiling.  So I wasn’t really expecting an answer.  But I got one, I guess: “I’m making a committee.”

“Uh.  Okay.”  I’m emptying out the dishwasher even though I’m pretty sure it’s someone else’s turn, and Camille is lining up clementines on the table.  Is he going to put them back in the bowl when he’s done?  No. “Whatever floats your boat, dude.  Want to help put away the silverware?”

“Not especially.”

“Uh.”

“[mumble mumble mumble] _sot_.”  Passive-aggressively semi-audible statement, this time directed at the kitchen table.

“Uh.”  The other half of the conversations around here consist of me saying _Uh._

“I said, ‘do not you mislike being a fool.’”

“Wow.  Thanks.  Thanks so much, _merci_ _beaucoup,_ and I appreciate your condescension in translating it into English.”

“Well—do you not?  _Oculos habent et non videbunt_ , one—s’ennuie.”

“…What are we talking about?”

“Yes, what _are_ you talking about?”  I guess neither of us was expecting Danton.  He picked up one of the clementines and Camille looked almost uneasy.  “Nothing?  Ah, the usual answer.”  Danton flicked a bit of peel in the direction of the trash.  He didn’t miss.  “A lot of nothing in this house.  I know why _we_ have to stay here, but what about you?  Nothing better than this and your sainted parents?”

I went back to stacking coffee mugs in the cupboard.  “No?  Got a girl somewhere hidden away?”

“I have a cat.  She’s staying with the sainted parents right now.”

“…God.  I love these people.  I ask if he has a mistress and he tells me he has a cat.   You know something?  Julie said the same thing.”  Julie?  Oh, right—Julie, at the library.  Danton just wants to make sure we all know he’s still talking to her, he’s found out she’s single.  High-five, sweet, did you get her digits bro.

It was about then that I really realized for the first time that these guys are my age.  I mean, Marat’s older, Saint-Just is younger, but basically these guys are my age.  Think about my friends: many of them getting married about now, or having babies—or getting together for trivia nights, a smaller and smaller group as the baby-having crowd drops out of the nighttime social circle.  Getting a little self-consciously too old for this nonsense, starting to think maybe you should have done more with your life, but still…yeah, I mean, you want to know if the cool librarian is seeing anyone right now.

I handed him the silverware bin and told him to put them away.  “Look, if you ask her for coffee sometime, and she says no, just drop it, right?  And if she says yes, maybe ask her about her cat?  Do you _like_ cats?”

“I don’t.  Camille probably does.”

But when we looked around for confirmation, Camille had left the room.  So I still don’t know what he was talking about before, _and_ he didn’t put away the clementines.  Where was I going with this anecdote, anyway?  I guess just killing time, like usual.

Maybe I should bring my cat over here.  I miss my damn cat.


	17. It is a wild goddamn party.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Welp.

I’m off the case.  Oh, not completely, not in disgrace, nothing like that.  My boss was very clear about it.  “This isn’t a reflection on your work.  You’ve done great work. But your position with these particular historicals was never meant to be long-term.”  so I’m bumped down to being the Weekend Guy.  (note that i never had a weekend guy, i’ve been here 24/7, faithful servant to the french revolution and the french revolution’s tonsilitis and passive-aggressive bitching and plans to harass the librarians and heartbreakingly polite fragility, but you know maybe it would have been nice to have someone come in a couple days a week like i’ll be doing now)

So i’ma get another beer now, hold on a sec.

okay I’m back

were you holding your breath, computer?

So right, yeah, in a couple weeks I’m down to just weekends here.  I guess i’m going to live with my parents for a bit? I dunno, I got someone subletting my room in the apartment and it’s not like I’m going to kick her out, I told her she could stay at least through the end of the school year which is, whatever, end of may?  gdi I was going to bring my cat here too. sorry Polly-Dolly, no french revolution for you, girl.

oh ffs now danton wants a beer too, brb, in fact fuck it i’m bringing my whole amazing stash (wolavers seasonal 12-pack, pretty good stuff) out here and everyone can have one IT IS A WILD GODDAMN PARTY, PEOPLE MIGHT GET A LIGHT BUZZ, WATCH OUT

Okay, back.  Sorry, getting ahold of myself.  I’m a little ticked off here.  Because, you know, I don’t buy that it’s 100% not a reflection on my work.  My boss went on a bit, something cagily polite and non-critical about how hard it is not to become “personally involved” in these home-care situations.  Am I personally involved? 

Sure.  I feel like I need to do something.  Which is stupid.  I’ll be here weekends, anyway, so it’s not like I need to make any dramatic gestures.  It’s just a case of disillusionment with the whole NEA scene.  I’ll get over it.  Disillusionment: it’s what for dinner.  And anyway, what _can_ I do for these guys?


	18. Good old General Tso

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The plants have all been watered, including the cactus on the second floor (don't water it again until the last week in April) (let Robespierre's jade plant get good and dry before you water it, it's a succulent).

Okay, this was my last full week (and I guess my first full week-end).  I’ve left approximately one thousand notes for the guy who’s coming in.  He’s someone from DC, the central office, multilingual, background in 18th-century history, super-duper qualified for everything ever.  And I guess someone from France is supposed to be getting here later this month to Evaluate.  Me and my high-school French will be discreetly out of the way.

I was worried this week would be difficult.  Let’s be honest, people do get a little tetchy when it comes up on an anniversary of their own death.  But it turned out not to be so bad.  I guess when you’ve only had three or four months to deal with the situation in the first place, a calendar date doesn’t make it much worse.  (I’ve read a study on death-anniversary coping; the second anniversary sees the most emotional disturbance.)  Dr. Robineau has been here pretty much every day, juggling appointments; Doctor “How’s the Exudate” Helsing, dermatologist extraordinaire, offered to take any volunteers out on a field trip to the Peabody Essex Museum.  It’s a pretty cool place—I know someone who works there—and I was supremely grateful when Marat and Saint-Just took her up on the invitation right away.  There was some kind of confused discussion while I was putting together sandwiches, and Danton ended up joining the museum party.  I guess he’s more bored than I realized?

So Friday it was just me and Camille and Robespierre.  Camille was chatty, restless, kind of annoying (I’m saying that objectively, it’s not really a complaint—I mean, I was ready to jump into action and hold hands or supply kleenexes or buy quarts of ice cream or whatever was needed, so listening to him flip through my iTunes and object to everything that came up was fine).  Robespierre read very, very quietly.  After lunch I put in a DVD from the library, a performance of _The Marriage of Figaro_ , which mostly kept everyone occupied.  Although while I was making dinner I got a long explanation of how the original play was so much better.  Yeah, yeah, I get it, you were into Figaro _before_ Mozart covered it, now it’s too mainstream.

Then this weekend Danton and Camille taught me weird eighteenth-century card games, gambling for mixed nuts; which led to me explaining dreidels to everyone; which meant looking it up on Wikipedia because fuck if I remember which letter means what; which led to Obscure Unvoiced Disapproval; which led to everyone inviting my parents over for dinner so I could show the French Revolution that I am a good son even if I don’t remember the rules to children’s holiday games; which led to take-out; which may have led to giving everyone the confused impression that General Tso’s Chicken is a traditional Jewish meal.  Saint-Just was intrepid about chopsticks.  Marat got a fortune that said “Smile—you are beautiful.”  Robespierre asked my parents how their dog is, and Danton asked how my cat is.  The guys made toasts to my mother that I am only 95% sure were appropriate.  They wouldn't make jokes about a guy's mom in Latin, would they? And I took a ton of pictures.

Aaaaand tomorrow I go back to my desk job as soon as New Guy gets here?  I don’t…I dunno, man.  It just feels weird and disconnected and even though this was a way chiller weekend than I expected it just feels like everyone is faking…something.  Meanwhile—fuck it.  I updated the grocery list; we’re low on Weetabix.  I left a post-it on the microwave reminding whoever it is to clear the time when he’s done.  Someone keeps stopping it a couple seconds early and then leaves a stupid flashing 0:02 on the screen.  I may or may not have contacted someone to look over my updated resumé.  I watered all the plants.


End file.
